I was just wondering what different peoples favorite method was and why. I have tried several a basic sifter, a screed and a brush, carefully bumping between frames, the baby powder container hand poof method and I also tried using a new/never used rose duster, but the volume was just too low to be effective. My personal favorite is like the baby powder container method on crack. I use clean bay powder container with a small hole drilled in the back end connected to an air nosle and and an 11 gallon compressed air tank. I can set it up and go out and treat 2 colonies with a fine cloud of powdered sugar in less than 5 minutes. The only real drawback I've found is that there is a little excess dust in the form a white cloud that coats everything it touches with a thin coat of very fine sugar although not enough sticks around to cause a major problem with pests. The 2 best things I've found is that it is very fast and I know for certain that every square inch of the inside of the hive and everything in it is throughly coated in a thin layer of fine sugar dust. Oh and another problem I just thought of is that you have to be careful of over pressurizing the baby powder container. Otherwise the top blows off and several cups of powdered sugar is instantly turned into a very large choking cloud and the cap can be difficult to relocate. Just imagine a guy in a bee suit stumbling out of a large white cloud, coughing, and searching frantically in the grass for little white cap and you can imagine how my first experiment with my contraption turned out. I just had to learn how to throttle my air pressure a bit better.

A cup of powdered sugar for each deep, sprinkled on top of second box and brushed in between the frames.

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Everyone said it couldn't be done. But he with a chuckle replied, "I won't be one to say it is so, until I give it a try." So he buckled right in with a trace of a grin. If he had a worry he hid it and he started to sing as he tackled that thing that couldn't be done, and he did it. (unknown)

wtiger. I did some powdered sugar treatments this late spring. I initially used a flour sifter and that took too long, so basically what I did was just took handfuls of powdered sugar (my hands are quite small) and put it on the top bars and brushed it down over the bees. I had read somewhere that it should be like an avalanche going over the bees. That is what it looked liked and I know it did quite a lot of good with reducing mite counts, that weren't even high to begin with. I did three treatments 5 days apart. At the end of the season I did a 3 day sticky board count, just to see how the mite levels were, just for my own personal information. The counts were so low that I felt that I didn't need to do an early fall treatment.

I have inserted sticky boards (just for fun and my own information) on Saturday that I am removing today to see what the mite levels are at this late stage of the game. This is simply information gathering, some say it is a waste of time to count mites, but I find nothing with the bees a waster of time. It is information gathering and knowledge of what is going on in the hive during certain parts of the year.

I will post my results of the mite count in the next few days. I have 9 colonies that are being checked. It is quite cool out, they are mostly in the winter cluster, except for yesterday, it was beautiful and warm and man did the bees have a field day, flying around. I didn't see any pollen coming in, but then I didn't watch them all day either. I was too busy building my new raised bed for my garlic and throwing more rocks to add to my great rock pile, :roll: ;) :) Have a wonderful day, in this great life of ours. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

I do not want to criticize, but I thought it wasn't a good idea to get all that sugar all over the place?? Could start a robbing situation. Well if it works for you then I guess it is fine. I am always careful not to get too much sugar all over the place.

I have used my flour sifter and a bee brush after to brush the sugar down between the frames. I have used about 1 cup per super and I usually start from the very bottom and work my way up to the top. It is very hard on me to always move the heavy supers off the hive, but the results have been really good with the mite counts.

I do this once a week for as many weeks as it takes to get the counts down. Now, I am only doing the dusting from the top supers as the cooler weather approaches and I do not want to break the seals on the supers.

Oh no, Annette, I think that I should have elaborated a little further on my sugar dusting. I forgot one very important part. When I did the powdered shakes, I had replaced the solid bottomboards with screened bottomboards. Of course, I did definitely not want all that sugar around so I placed sheets of newspaper beneath each colony and gathered up all the remains that fell onto it.

I am not sure that powdered sugar would start a robbing situation, such as would be if a lot of sugar syrup spilled. I don't think that powdered sugar would be overly appealing to bees, honestly. I think that they are more anxious to obtain a liquid in their honey stomach, like nectar or sugar syrup, not dry sugar. I think that that would be fairly hard to collect. I am pretty sure about what I am saying here. But just speaking out loud, I could be wrong for sure.

One point that you spoke about Annette, was you said you work from the bottom up. Obviously you are removing the second brood chamber and then putting it back, right? If you have honey supers on, I don't think that you should sugar shake, but then again I am not too sure about that either, again, just thinking out loud.

When I did the sugar dusting, I did not do the chambers separately, I simply left the two brood chambers in place and dusted from the top. I am pretty positive that the amount of sugar floated all down and covered the bees in the bottom box too. Did you hear somewhere that you need to do each box separately, maybe I missed something and am doing it wrong myself. Living, learning, eh, girl?

Dennis, I am in the southwestern corner of Canada, near a place called Vancouver, I am about 45 km from the ocean. We have pretty mild temperatures in the wintertime. We have experienced some fairly hard frosts for the past two weeks when the skies are clear. But living in a rainy climate, the weather usually remains above the freezing point. We on occasion get some snow that may last for a few days to a couple of weeks, the latter is infrequently. January will tend to be our coldest month. We can get a couple of weeks of deep freezing, no snow, because when it freezes here the skies will certainly be clear. We can have freezing ground to a depth of about 8 inches, never ever deeper than that. Now and then the small lakes in our areas will freeze over, but again that is unusual. We are rainy and cool.

I am not working with the bees any more, there is no need to. They have been fed plenty for winter stores and I feel their hives are very heavy. The bees will still come out in great numbers. For example the past couple of days the weather has been very warm, when the sun is shining. I don't know the temperature that has been during these warm days, but I have worked outside with a T-shirt for a couple of hours when the sun was higher on the horizon, but when the sun waned, the coat came back on. Cold. Today is rainy. The temperature currently is: 8 C ( 46 F). We begin to feed pollen around the middle of February for brood stimulation. Is this the kind of answer that you needed to have? Have a wonderful day, beautiful life, loving this life we live. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

I was referring to wtiger about all the powdered sugar going everywhere, not you. But you have enlightened me about the powdered sugar perhaps not being a problem if it goes all around. I do know that it attracts many ants though, but they do not bother the hives.

I remove all the supers and start from the bottom, because that is what I was told would be the best way to get at all the mites. But it was a very hard summer for me having to remove all those supers and I think that for now on, I will just do the second brood box as you mentioned, and let it trickle on down. I do not do the honey supers that are for me. I remove them first, then do the dusting. But the honey super for the bees, I do powdered sugar dust them also.

Thank you for your reply. I am also learning every day and am open to everything.

.I think that powered sugar is not recommend in Europa. It is vain job in varroa control. It is more beekeepers therapy than real control.

Europa is at least 5-7 years ahead USA and Canada, and somehow USA want's do same researches as Europa 5 years ago.

But if powered sugar makes beekeeper sleep better, it is value too. But mostly in this Forum varroa control systems do not stand European skill level - Sorry. I think that this forum do not learn new in varroa issue.

The sugar all over the place was only really an issue that one time the cap blew off. I had yellow jackets and ants all over. Otherwise there isn't enough that settles around the hives to make a difference.

Billl from NJ. Ensure that you do read that post that Robo put in his post for sure. It is important to be informed and understand about what we are using for our bees. The varroa mite hazzard is real, it will terminate colonies eventually, if the bees have the mites. To do nothing is wrong. (there is considerable evidence that small cell works for some beekeepers in some areas with the varroa destructor mite, that is talked about all over this forum). It is our job as tentative great beekeepers to look after our girls, for sake of the pollination that they do that provides food for human beings, the byproducts of the hives that us as humans (and animals too actually, bee pollen is fed to livestock, hee, hee) love and enjoy. Have a wonderful and beautiful day, greatest of health. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Enlighten me Finsky... of the great European socialist way to control Varroa.

European countries have carefully went through varroa control methods. They are tens. If we take all sosialist Russian methods into use, they are maybe 50.

By the aid of European Union, some countries co-operated and sieved best and safest methods some years ago. One key person has been professor nanetti from Italy. Our forum master Seppo is a member of that varroa group. He is whole day beekeeping researcher in Finland and has a lot of hives. He has studied beekeeping in Los Angeles University.

i used powdered sugar this year consistently. i had very few mites by the time i did the apiguard treatment in the fall. i'm not sure that the PS was really needed this year because i had all hives queenless at one time or another. bad year.

the PS treatment makes sense in that it stimulates the grooming behavior. as a stand alone treatment for mite control, i doubt it is enough for most of us. i look at it as a way to keep numbers down until fall treatments that really kill the suckers.

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.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....

OA is not approved for use here yet. maybe when it is, we can all go for once a year and forget the rest :-)

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.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....

Until it's approved we can bleach the wooden frames! ;)As was said before ,powdered sugar isn't approved for that either,nor is mineral oil fogging or oxalic vapors!Like Finsky said, drivibg over posted speed is also not legal. For the record I am not advocating breaking the law. we need to band together to get oxalic approved!!Sorry, this topic is for favorite method for PS.

As was said before ,powdered sugar isn't approved for that either,nor is mineral oil fogging or oxalic vapors!

true, but both PS and mineral oil are approved for ingestion. OA is not. if i sell my honey i will not get busted for having sold out of a powdered sugar dusted hive. OA? that's another story.

as for aproval...yes, that would be good. you'd think they'd be hot on that.

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.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called “the government.” They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....